


Counting Sheep

by pyrrhic_victoly



Category: Kyou Kara Maou!
Genre: Adoption, Families of Choice, Gen, Unconventional Families
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-05-10
Updated: 2009-05-10
Packaged: 2018-02-06 00:42:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1838086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pyrrhic_victoly/pseuds/pyrrhic_victoly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Greta has trouble sleeping and thinks about her parents.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Counting Sheep

**Author's Note:**

> This was actually my first fic. OMG WHAT. So long ago. Ah, the memories... (Typing this note from June 2014 btw.)

Greta couldn't sleep. Things were tense at Blood Pledge castle, and everyone was busy…too busy to read Greta a bedtime story.

Yuuri was on Earth. Wolfram and Conrad were patrolling the borders. Gwendal and Gunter were swamped with even more paperwork than usual.

Greta knew she was a big girl now. She was ten! Almost eleven! She shouldn't need to be tucked in to bed every night like a baby, but after years and years of loneliness, of wishing that her mommy and daddy would pop in like a fairy tale and rescue her from her awful relatives… After all that, and then suddenly finding herself with two adoptive fathers, Greta found that she'd grown used to the attention, and it was hard to be alone now, even for just one night.

During lessons that morning, Gunter had told her, in his usual flowery way, to think about her fathers' love if things ever got too sad. He made a very extravagant speech before he was called away to meet ambassadors from Caloria. Greta was thinking about it right now. Maybe…maybe if she thought hard enough, it would be like her fathers were there with her.

Greta thought about Papa Yuuri. When he was in Shin Makoku, Yuuri always had a smile and a hug for Greta. Greta loved playing with Yuuri, but he was gone a lot of the time, so she had to make the time she had with him count.

When Yuuri was gone, Greta would usually cuddle with Papa Wolf. He wasn't as open with his affections, but Wolfram was a steady presence. He was almost always there. When he wasn't, Greta knew exactly how long he'd be gone. He had a schedule, and there was always time for Greta.

Between the two of them, Greta was sure she was the most loved girl in Shin Makoku.

It was weird, she thought, that Papa Yuuri and Papa Wolf didn't look old enough to be her parents at all. Before, when Greta would dream up parents for herself, they were always a bit older, at least in appearance. (Papa Wolf was old enough to be her grandfather – in human years, anyway.)

After meeting Hube, her first friend, Greta's dream-father started to look a lot like Hube. He would be a big man. Tall, and with shoulders broad enough for her to sit on. Greta would walk next to him and have to look up, and up, and up just to see his face. He would pick her up and she would feel like she was sitting on a mountain. He would hold her with his big, rough hands and whisper gently in her ear. His low, rumbling voice said that she was safe with him.

Sometimes, Greta likes to imagine that she managed to predict meeting Gwendal…

Greta thinks about fathers. She thinks about Gwendal's voice, Wolfram's steady presence, and Yuuri's smile. She thinks about playing baseball with Conrad and Gunter's patience during lessons.

Greta thinks about mothers. She thinks about Anissina's books and Grandma Cheri's insistence that little girls were meant to be spoiled; how Gisela always kisses her bruises and scrapes away. For a little while, she even thinks about her friend Izura, who has the same name as her birth mother, and who writes letters to her sometimes.

Suddenly, Greta remembers that Yuuri said in his world, people count sheep when they can't sleep. She realizes that she has just been counting parents, and thinks that she must be the luckiest, most loved girl in the whole WORLD.

Greta falls asleep with a smile.


End file.
